“Now, Phoebe,” answered David, looking down at her with the quickly concealed tenderness that always flashed up in his eyes when he spoke directly to her, “do you suppose for one minute that I hadn’t fixed all that the first thing?  Mrs. Cherry held back a bit but I rabbit-footed the old lady into being wild to go and then wheedled the correct hostess some; and there you are!  Caroline is to send them out in her motor and I’m going to make Hob and Tom chase the possum in company of the merry widow and Mrs. Big Bug.  Now give me a glad word!”

“I’ll see,” answered Phoebe.  “I can let you know by two o’clock whether I can go,” and as she spoke she gathered up her gloves and bag and settled her trim hat by a glance at the long mirror across the room.

“What—­what did you say?” demanded David aghast in a second.  “If you think for one minute that I’m going to stand for—­”

“But you must remember that my business engagements must always be settled before I can make social ones—­at two o’clock then!  Good-by, Caroline, dear, such a comfy night under your care!  I’m going to stop in the library to speak to the major and then on to the guild if any one calls.  Here’s to you both!” and she coolly tipped them a kiss from the ends of her fingers.

“Caroline,” remarked David, “I reckon I must have giggled too loud in my cradle, and the Lord turned around and made Phoebe to settle my glee, don’t you think?”

And as Caroline saw him depart with his usual smile and jest she little realized that a jagged wound ran across his blithe heart.

The David within was awakening and developing a highly sensitized nature, which caught Phoebe’s note of disapproval, divined its reason and winced under the humiliation of its distrust.  The old David would have laughed, chaffed her and gone his way rejoicing—­the new David suffered, for a deeply-loved woman can inflict a wound on the inner man that throbs to the depths.

Across the hall Phoebe found the major at his table and, as usual, buried in his books.  He was reading one and holding another open in his hand while his pen balanced itself over a page for a note.  Phoebe hesitated on the threshold, loath to disturb his feast.  But before she could retreat he glanced up and his smile flashed a welcome and an invitation to her, while his books fell together as he rose and held out his hands.

“My dear,” he said, “I was just reading what Bob Browning says about a ’pearl and a girl’—­and thinking of you when up I look to behold you.”

“Thank you, and good morning, Major,” returned Phoebe as a slow smile spread over her grave face.  “I won’t disturb you, for I’ve only a moment!  This hunt to-night—­it—­it troubles me.  Has David forgotten that he is to make a speech on the cutting of the conduit over in the sixteenth ward at half-past seven o’clock?  It is one of his most important appointments and—­”

“Phoebe,” answered the major as he balanced his pen on one long lean finger, “do you suppose that women will ever learn that men could dispense with them entirely after their second year—­if it wasn’t for the loneliness?  I see David Kildare failed to make a sufficiently full apron-string report to you this morning of his intentions for the day.”